It's A Dwarf Thing
by Writer's Whimsy
Summary: Kili has had enough of Bilbo's not-so-subtle staring at the Company when they stop to rest and confronts him about it. Light-hearted. Company!Bonding. Confused!Bilbo


Bilbo was watching them.

Kili kneed his bother in the shoulder and received an automatic elbow to the leg in return.

Kili sighed and tugged the braid he was working on in the hobbits' general direction. He received an even harder jab with a bonier-than-it-had-any-right-to-be elbow and an annoyed huff for his troubles. Kili rolled his eyes and whispered under his breath, "We have an audience."

It wasn't the first time he'd caught the hobbit watching. He'd feel it a bit weirder if it wasn't for the fact that Bilbo watched the others like that too. Always when things were quieter. And always with that queer expression upon his face.

"Perhaps you'd care for a braid of your own Master Hobbit?" Fili asked and Kili didn't need to see his face to know he was smirking beneath his freshly groomed moustache.

Kili grinned at Bilbo over the top of Fili's head and carried on with his work. He hardly needed to look at his hands for them to go about their familiar task. The look on the hobbit's face was a picture. Wide eyed, mouth like a drowning fish and a rush of colour like an embarrassed maid.

"Oh! I am sorry! That is to say, I didn't mean to stare. Not- Not that I was staring. I was just um…" It never got old, watching the halfling flail for words. "What are you doing?" he suddenly blurted, looking like he wished the ground would open up and swallow him whole the moment the words left his mouth.

Kili's hands stilled and he couldn't help the confused twist to his features. It was really quite obvious. Even to a Hobbit, surely.

"That is, I know _what_ you are doing, I mean to ask _why_."

"Why?" Kili repeated slowly.

"Yes," Bilbo replied, looking a little bolder now that he hadn't immediately been laughed at. "Is it- I mean, well, you do Fili's hair and Fili does yours." Kili felt Fili give a slow, bemused nod. "And Dori does Ori's and Nori helps with Dori's and well, it's just that even when Gloin had a rather disgusting amount of Orc blood in the back of his hair where he couldn't reach last week he waited until Oin could assist him combing it out rather than ask Bofur who was sat right next to him doing nothing at all!"

"Well," Kili replied, when it became apparent that Fili wasn't going to say anything. His fingers resumed their work. "Gloin's married isn't he? Hardly going to be knocking boots with Bofur when he's got a dwarrowdam like her waiting for him back home."

And even though that should have cleared things up completely, Bilbo looked more confused than ever.

Fili elbowed him in exactly the same spot as before and dammit if he wasn't going to leave a bruise. Kili dropped a hand to dig his knuckles sharply in to his brother's back. Not hard or anything, just enough to make Fili's breath go oomph a little. In retaliation, Fili threw his weight into one of his shoulders, knocking Kili's knee hard enough to almost unseat him from the rock he was perched on. Fili let out and indignant, surprised squawk when the resulting lurch ended up dragging him back along with his brother due to Kili's firm hold on his half finished braid.

"Curses, Kili! Watch it."

"Piss off!"

"Ahem, boys? Sorry. I'm afraid I still don't understand."

Kili and Fili stopped their impromptu scuffle and turned back to a perplexed Bilbo. With a last shove or two, the brothers settled themselves back into their original positions and Kili picked out the braid he had been working on and quickly unravelled it before starting to redo it.

He frowned at his hands as he worked. What else was there to say?

"They're brothers," Fili explained, elbow resting comfortably on a pulled up knee. "Oin and Gloin. Bofur's not."

"Oh," said Bilbo with a blink. "So it's a brother thing? You do this-" he waved an ambiguous hand in their general direction, still looking somewhat embarrassed. "Because you're brothers?"

Kili couldn't help himself.

"Well, _yeah_. Not like I'm knocking boots with this idiot either. I have way better taste."

Again with the bony elbow. Where the heck did he even get those things from anyway? He certainly didn't have such pointy elbows.

"Don't families do this in the Shire?" Fili asked kindly, finally seeming to understand what was puzzling Bilbo so much.

"Well, sort of," Bilbo admitted. "My mother did my hair all the time when I was a lad but it's not like she was the only one. My aunt Myrtle – who's not really my aunt you understand, though she is my third cousin once removed on my mother's side and my second cousin by marriage on my father's – she used to do everybody's hair. Especially if it was a party day."

Fili nodded his head. Kili tugged on the braid to make him stop it before he lost his grip and had to start again for the third time. He fished the carved silver clip from where he'd stored it in his pocket and clipped it around the bottom of the finished braid before moving on to the next one, this time on Fili's left.

"For us dwarves, only close kin are permitted to braid your hair. Or a lover, if you've been at it a while and are thinking of making it serious. It is… very personal. Some consider it an honour."

"Oh!" exclaimed Bilbo, looking like he finally got it, nodding his head and plucking at his waistcoat. He coloured again. "It's not- not too personal?" he squeaked. "Only, I've been watching you- Only trying to understand, you see. It is rather peculiar. Not to- I mean-"

"It's fine, Bilbo," Fili said before the hobbit could truly get himself worked up. "If it were that personal, we wouldn't be doing it where you could see, would we?"

Bilbo looked relieved.

"I dunno," Kili grinned. "Reckon Nori's got a bit of an exhibition- Ow! Bloody hell!"

That accursed elbow again. Definitely going to leave a bruise.

"Leave him be," Fili chided.

Kili rolled his eyes but refrained from finishing what he was going to say.

Bilbo had turned an interesting shade of pink again and was fiddling with something in his pocket, as he was want to do when he got flustered.

"Yes, well. I'll leave you to it," he said firmly before turning on his heel and heading for the wizard who was smoking peacefully on his pipe, gaze lost on the horizon.

Kili snorted and finished another braid, clipping the silver clasp securely. He leant to one side, then the other, checking for evenness before starting on the fourth braid.

Fili settled back against his brother's legs and relaxed into the gentle rasp and tug of Kili's work.


End file.
